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Lance
from Manhattan

RUCB, you can be a case study in the political blinders theory. I could tell you that if a few dollars more in gas could cause a person to default on their mortgage, they probably shouldn't have had it in the first place,with no down payment no less. There is something to be said for renting as most of us in this area do. There was plenty of greed on the lenders and buyers end. Lenders looking to repackage loans and buyers thinking they should get in on the action and could flip before rates adjusted. I won't bother to go on as it will probably be fruitless for the both of us. Good luck out there. In a world where no one can look outside of their own interest or point of view, we are in for a lot of pain.

Okay history lesson as far as it goes. Try 'All the Devils are Here' for a more complete take on why the sub-prime meltdown occurred when it did.

My take on why is more succinct. Dubya let $140/bbl oil - and therefore $4+/g gasoline persist for six months. This caused LOTS of mortgage payers to have to choose between the commute to work and this month's mortgage payment. What had been a problem - sub-prime defaults - became an issue that nearly brought down our entire economy. Dubya had the power to at least threaten release from the strategic reserve but was ideologically barred from doing so.

People seem to forget the many of the problems we faced in this downturn had its start in the 90's. The deregulation of the banks under Barney Frank. The loosening of mortgage requirements, NAFTA, favored trade status with China.

We look at those times as something we need to repeat, but it was based on smoke and mirrors. We had a cold war ending dividend allowing a temporary reduction in military expenditures, a ponzi stock market, a fed chairmen who loved easy money and had the third world to control inflation pressures for him, a president who had to make concessions with an opposing party to control expenditures.

I think Clinton is given far more kudos than deserved. Now don't think I am a flag waving Republican - I could not wait for the GWB administration to end. My problem is very few people have the ability to look a step deeper than the headlines and the media is at fault for this. The problem is on both sides and watching this red team blue team football game is sickening.

"I guess it's OK with you that Obama has raised that debt to 17 Trillion and counting? "

Okay? Certainly not. But the fastest path to a balanced budget is to put the 2M put out of work in the Great Recession back in jobs that earn enough to PAY TAXES. That's where the focus should be. Prioritizing deficits over employment is guaranteeing the pain is longer. The GOP is only for it because they are OUT of POWER. Their latest behavior can only guarantee that they will STAY OUT OF POWER.

$5.5T added to the debt since Obama has had the reigns (remember FY 2009 was a Bush year) is bad but Dubya engineering a swing that bends the arc from cutting the debt in half to adding $6.5T (a $9T swing) of his own spending and you want to give the party that engineered it control again? Who has got those blinders on?

RUCBPeople who are fighting spending right now were not in Congress at the time of those increases. I guess it's OK with you that Obama has raised that debt to 17 Trillion and counting? Huh? Do you think Clinton would have had those surpluses without the dot-com bubble and his own concessions over spending with the Republicans. Look outside of your partisan glasses one in a while.

"Using "crazy wing" to describe elected officials who were sent to congress to try and get a handle on wasteful spending is amazingly childish."

If the GOP were so on fire about wasteful spending, why did they let Dubya double the debt - $5T to $11.5T- in seven years? Why only seven years? Clinton's last fiscal year (2001) CUT THE DEBT by $235B.

I think 'crazy wing' is an apt description for a party that would stymie majority rule and cease ALL GOVERNMENT function in order to block a plan that would let 45M Americans buy health insurance.

If you are certain it is a flop, let it flop. We'll survive to change or repeal it. But taking the country hostage because you do not have the electoral power to get your way is childish and unconstitutional.

What are the hidden items in the Affordable Care Act that are so terrible that the Democrats are willing to cause the government to default just so they do not have to live under it like the rest of us? Basically, that was the last sticking point for over a week now!

"The GOP’s Backdoor Impeachment Scheme-- Republicans have lost at the ballot box and the Supreme Court, so they’ve decided to nullify President Obama another way: keep his government from working, period."thedailybeast.com/articles/2013/10/14/the-gop-s-backdoor-impeachment-scheme.html

So I guess that then Senator Obama should have been labeled one of those "crazies" by Brian since with the gift of youtube anyone can see him expound on why he voted down an increase in the debt ceiling, and would not vote for one and how he went on to chastise the prior administration of borrowing and spending. I guess I am forgetting Brian bloviating on that. The irony is amusing.

jgarbuz, we want babies. We also want to be able to feed, clothe, shelter and educate them. We want to feed, clothe, shelter and educate ourselves as well. We want babies to have a future, a quality of life, a chance. Forgive us women for being hopelessly practical but we can't rely on men to be that way, especially GOP men, they don't care for the born as much as they tout the rights of the unborn. The unborn are so much cheaper....

Actually, "Amazing Grace," written by a reformed slave ship captain, is about a sinner who is saved from being lost ("but now am found") & blind ("but now I see"). If they're praying to have their eyes opened, I'm all for that!

Senator Grassley, who is on Medicare and therefore no longer getting the employer subsidy (and a multi-millionaire who makes $175K year on his Congressional salary alone), wants to take it away from the younger staffers? What a great champion of the little guy!

What do you expect when the HOUSE is run by a MINORITY of the MINORITY party? The GOP have very little respect for the standards of 'majority rule' and 'One man, one vote'. My hope is that Americans stay angry enough through November 4, 2014 in order to get their hands off of the controls of government.

Wow, "democracy" at work. So 1 committee (probably even more of a minority than the Tea Party members) can change the rules w/out a full vote, & now the speaker can single-handedly keep a proposed bill from coming to a vote. I thought we only had that in the NYC City Council!

"Barry Obama could end this farce quickly, but he needs it to distract the masses from this floundering economy."

You think the economy is floundering now! (Only unemployment is weak, most other sectors have recovered) Just you wait until the failure to raise the debt ceiling filters through. If Congress fails to raise the ceiling the GOP will own the blunting of the recovery AND the new recession that inaction causes. Not very sensible if you want BHO to be seen as the blunderer, is it?

As usual, your commentary is just a pile of random hate against Obama and makes no sense.

O-care, among other things, is a large entrenchment of abortion into our society: every insurance plan has to cover abortion, and everyone contributes to an 'abortion kitty'.

Every time a society takes a step toward abortion bad things happen, and quickly. The day O-care was put into effect, the government shut down. And now we face the debt ceiling. Is this the disaster which will happen? Not sure, but it wouldn't surprise me if they thought they had a deal, and at the last minute ... it fell through.

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